Julian Dobson
So what do the punters make of the government’s empowerment action plan? If indications from New Start’s conference on empowerment today are anything to go by, most are sitting on the fence.
Given that we’ve been talking about empowerment since at least 1999, when Policy Action Team 9 reported (remember the famous seven principles of empowerment?) we seem to be spending a long time making our minds up. Asking for a show of hands on the issue revealed that most people prefer not to show their hands. The few who did were pretty evenly split between the enthusiasts and the cynics.
It’s been a long march that has given us the national strategy for neighbourhood renewal (2001), the establishment of community empowerment networks and local strategic partnerships, the single community programme (2003), the Together We Can action plan (2005), the local government white paper (2006) and the action plan for community empowerment (last month). But perhaps it’s been less of a relentless advance than a replication of Mao’s circuitous and costly Long March of the 1930s.
A couple of comments from two of today’s speakers may shed some light on this. Here’s Stephen Thake, member of the Quirk review on community assets, talking about the mentality of many in local government: ‘There are thousands of naysayers and few people who say, “we can do this”. The issues are in people’s heads. The issues are cultural, not substantive.’
And here’s Hugh Rolo of the Development Trusts Association: ‘Central and local government say “we want to empower you”, but what’s happening is completely different. Central and local government are hierarchical organisations. The people we see are disempowered. They can’t do anything without referring right back to the top of their organisations.’
That said, there are plenty of examples of communities that have become empowered. How? For the most part, by deciding to get things done despite the policies of local and central government rather than because of them. Liverpool, for example, can offer a long list of such exemplars of empowerment.
Perhaps Malcolm X was right: ‘Power never takes a back step – only in the face of more power.’
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With regard to the empowerment initiative: some of us would be more enthusiastic if the rhetoric was matched by action on the ground. In Birmingham we have the remarkable situation of the local authority being identified as an examplar of best practice at the same time as it ends funding for the CEN and the Association of Neighbourhood Forums. From 1 December there will be precisely NIL community engagement institutions in the city. How can the the government let them get away with it?
What do punters make of the national empowerment action plan? Fully agree with David (above) as per my comments about Lewisham this week. But also to add some further thoughts into the ether:
The politics of brutalism – the various policy papers doing the rounds re the third sector review, LSPs, LAAs, Compact all make terribly naive references to the need for the voluntary / community sector to be independent as if, quite possibly, they had no idea how power is played out at a local level, which is most often simple and brutal. The nail that sticks out gets hammered down etc. Empowerment is always going to be a contested and fractious process. To have a document that seemingly has no understanding of how power is used by those who have it is daft. There are of course examples of people and places who travelled hopefully and at present got to a reasonable place but closer intelligence often suggests they in effect do what the local authority tells them to.
Second idea to throw out – the death of the social – as written by N. Rose (1996). What I want to note is the expanisve nature of the state, both central and local. Set this aside the falling voter turn out, the call from the Power Commission for different politics and the lack of imagination as regards last year's Governance of Britain (MofJustice) and the empowerment action plan feels more of a takeover bid than an enabler. Rose talks about community becoming colonised, a zone for government intervention – see Blears on ungoverned spaces. Of course there will always be a community sector partly because it has next to no funding and therefore is beholden to no one and often the healthier for it.
Finally – the idea that the third sector can transform public services should alert us to some harsher political realities – politicians want votes, (many) voters want low taxes, quality services cost money, the third sector is a cheap option. In terms of the modernising local government agenda – see In Touch with the People (1998) – three strands; services, local leadership and democracy. Ten years on it seems mostly to have truncated into services with far less attention on democratic innovation, let alone devolved power and higher turnouts.
That’s not to say it's all gloom but we really need a far more critical debate if we’re going to get anywhere
Matt
Stephen Thake, contributer to the Quirk review, speaks of local government naysayers. Gordon Brown’s open letter to local media in the wake of community action against the recent floods was headed Community Champions.
The Community Champions programme proposed by David Blunkett in 2000 is to end in 2008, part of the local issues at local level plan.
The programme awards amounts of up to £2000 to individuals with an idea to help their community. Over the years this has averaged at 12 awards per borough per year in London, fewer elsewhere but with astonishingly positive results. It is unlikely LAAs and LSPs will find this cost and time effective.
Sorry Stephen, award winners are called CanDoers and sorry, Gordon, award winners are Community Champions.
The programme’s strapline is ‘Putting the heart back into communities’ and it does, so why end it? An ideal fit for the Office of the Third Sector – a small amount (£3mill nationally), it has to be value for money.